


skull confetti

by PikaCheeka



Category: DRAMAtical Murder (Visual Novel), DRAMAtical Murder - All Media Types
Genre: First Kiss, Fist Fights, M/M, asexual Noiz, hate makeout sessions, not really a first date
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-06
Updated: 2016-04-06
Packaged: 2018-05-31 13:54:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,956
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6472636
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PikaCheeka/pseuds/PikaCheeka
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The first time they meet, they come to blows, but Noiz also steals something of Koujaku's. Now he needs to return it, and he fully intends to prolong his visit to the older man's house as long as possible.<br/>---<br/>Because he remembers his face. That is a rarity, a rarity to even properly see another’s face beyond a screaming void with ugly eyes and no edges, but most of all he remembers his scars. He remembers the scars across the other man’s fingers, taps the identification card softly against his lips, turns one corner of his mouth up ever so slightly. Koujaku.  And then he licks it, slowly drawing his tongue over the photograph, the words giving his life away. It tastes of plastic, yes, but it also tastes of scars and sadness and sex and rage and red and a thousand other things that define him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	skull confetti

**Author's Note:**

> Another KouNoi fic, arguably the "first" chronologically, as it takes place immediately after they meet in canon. This one is rather long and bizarre. Unlike my other two KouNois, this one is more from Noiz's perspective, and he tends to run away from me so I just let this fic go where it wanted. Like my other Noiz-centered fic, there's some sensory distortion, synesthesiac elements, and oral fixation.

Noiz turns the lights on when he gets home, something he rarely does. He pauses in the hallway, paces back and forth a few moments before stepping into the closet and immediately hunching down. Rocking back on his heels, he glances up at the ceiling. This is a good space. There is enough light from the hall that he can see as he delicately draws an object from his pocket, but not enough to give him a headache. He wants to concentrate in the dim air and relish this moment.

It’s a wallet.

 _His_ wallet, specifically. The man he’d just fought with in Sly Blue’s house. Tearing through his house and poking through his computers had been surprisingly – disappointingly — boring, but his stupid looking friend had made up for it.

Sometimes he smiles with his tongue, edges curling up inside his mouth to mimic the lips. It’s a rare smile, the only kind he can ever feel, the only kind he genuinely means, as far as he can tell. This was the kind of smile he found himself making when he first saw the other man, saw the rage in his eyes when he softly provoked him. When the larger man had stepped towards him, fist raised menacingly, his face strangely sharp and clear in the dim light and the colors of his clothing less grating than anything he’d seen in months, and Noiz had first felt the edges of his chipped teeth with his curled tongue, he knew they would fight and he knew he was happy and he knew he would find a way to meet him again.

Even now, he doesn’t know if stealing the wallet was a compulsive act or if it was calculated, but it worked. The moment they’d both crashed to the floor, he’d caught a glimpse of the alarmingly plain black jeans beneath his outrageous kimono and seconds later he had the wallet in his palm, in his own pocket, and that was the end of it. He is a scrappy fighter, vicious and brutal and everywhere at once, and the other man had been too busy softening blows to worry about the hand that wasn’t in a fist. He hadn’t used his iron knuckles, hadn’t gouged his eyes out or shattered his nose so that shards penetrated his brain and left him for dead or crushed his throat or aimed for a single area where he knew he could kill with a single blow. He’d only played with him, wrestled and thrashed across the floor of Sly Blue’s bedroom until that old woman had shown up and slapped both of them and dragged them downstairs and fed them and sent them on their ways, but not before he managed to land a few good kicks on the Japanese man’s shins beneath the table.

And now he is home, crouched low in the dim dust of his hallway closet with the man’s wallet. Yes, he has a way to see him again now. He opens it slowly, closing his eyes a moment before cracking them open to peer through his lashes as he slides the identification card out.

He exhales loudly despite himself.

It’s in kanji. That’s frustrating. But he had heard his name spoken _Koujaku_ and he can read his height _186 cm_ (taller than him, and much heavier too) and he can read his birthday _August 19_ (eight years before his own). He’s 27. _Unexpected, though age means little_ , he thinks absently as he runs the card over his Coil, scanning and encrypting it for later translation, before turning it over to study the photo more closely.

It isn’t that he needs to look. Because he remembers his face. That is a rarity, a rarity to even properly see another’s face beyond a screaming void with ugly eyes and no edges, but most of all he remembers his scars.

He remembers the scars across the other man’s fingers, taps the identification card softly against his lips, turns one corner of his mouth up ever so slightly. _Koujaku._ And then he licks it, slowly drawing his tongue over the photograph, the words giving his life away. It tastes of plastic, yes, but it also tastes of scars and sadness and sex and rage and red and a thousand other things that define him. Noiz pauses, leaving his tongue pressed against the card for a long moment. _I want to…_ He doesn’t know what though, so he merely shrugs, flips the card, licks that side too, before shoving it in his mouth. He teases a corner into his tongue frenulum ring and pushes down, tugging at the piercing, slowly twisting it until the pain is divine and tastes of scars and red.

He remembers the way Koujaku dodged his first blow, remembers the solid sound his fist made when he finally connected with his chest, but most of all he remembers the older man’s weight on him, enough pressure for even his dulled body to feel some sense of his strength. It’s something entirely new, something that prompted him to steal the wallet in the first place. Digging the corner of the card under his tongue again, he slowly tilts his head back, lets his eyes roll as his lids flutter closed, and revels in the soft pain. He is completely silent.

He doesn’t know how long he stays in this position, savoring the discomfort he so rarely experiences, before he opens his eyes, lowers his head, slowly draws the card from his mouth, watches a string of saliva break between it and his tongue before frowning. _Teethmarks._ He hadn’t realized he’d clenched his teeth around it, didn’t understand enough about what those memories stirred in him. Hoping the marks aren’t noticeable, he places it carefully on the floor in front of him and opens the wallet again.

There are two credit cards. One expiration date only two months behind the other, both far in the distance. Either he got them both at the same time, crashed into the easily trackable world of card purchases all at once, or he was neurotic and requested all his deadlines be similar. _Strange._ Noiz turns them both over, compares the numbers, the three-digit code, the signatures on the back. He licks both. Same marker. _Nerd probably does calligraphy._

A subway card. Well-worn. Not Midorijima. _So he has access off the island._ That might be good to know, for the future. Information like this is always good. Not because it’s about _him,_ he reminds himself as he presses it to his lips, slides his tongue across it, tastes the exhaustion of traveling, the crush of the masses at the gate, the clock ticking loudly at the station. _Just because it’s information._ Noiz himself can come and go from Midorijima as he pleases, and he knows a hundred ways to get someone else off the island, but it’s always good to have one hundred and one.

Several membership cards for convenience stores, a grocery, a used bookstore. A business card for a tattoo artist. Noiz pauses at that, remembering the smear of blue across his chest. Several business cards with his own name on them. He can’t read the kanji, as usual, but he understands the scissors. He compulsively sticks a card into his mouth, remembering the man’s clean nails, his carefully parted hair, the clearly expensive hairstick in his ponytail. Hairdresser. He thinks about scissors and rocks back into his heels a moment. Years ago, when he was only sixteen and new to face-to-face dealings, something had gone wrong with the Yakuza and there’d been talk of cutting his fingers off, not just the tips because a stupid foreigner scam artist didn’t deserve that, but the entire finger. He’d gotten away, because when he casually stood and rifled through the desk and pulled out the scissors and proceeded to cut his own pinky off, the man interrogating him had slapped him across the face and told him to leave and never comeback, the little freak. The finger is still attached, though sometimes it sticks when he tries to flatten his hand. It wasn’t the first time he’d mutilated himself with scissors, and it certainly wouldn’t be the last. He wonders how Koujaku holds them, wonders if he’d ever cut anyone in rage and if he could be provoked into it, and feels his chipped teeth again.

The last thing he removes is the cash. 18,000 yen in bills, several big bills at that. A suspicious amount, but then, Koujaku was a suspicious man. Noiz methodically runs his tongue over each bill. 5,000. 5,000. 5,000. 2,000. 1,000. The fourth one tastes different, crisper, more fresh and smooth somehow. He draws his fingers over it, runs them over the first bill next, and wonders absently what the difference is, but his dead fingers feel nothing. He doesn’t expect anything, stopped hoping that would change well over a decade ago, but it’s an old habit, one he normally curbs by keeping his hands stuffed in his pockets, clenched and angry and so full of hate to account for their lack of all other feeling.

The credit cards and subway card he scans through his Coil. He’ll examine the findings later. Find out what he buys, where he goes, so he’ll always know where to find the man with the clear face and edges in his clothing and suspicious lack of blurred color and screeching light.

He keeps the cash.

\--

The address his coil spits out is surprisingly close to his own.

It’s the old quarter, some houses dating back to the seventeenth century and the money keeping them up about the same. Noiz had never bothered learning anything of Japanese history, but he knows money when he sees it, and only fools would bother spending millions on houses that don’t even have proper air conditioning. So Koujaku is indeed rich, and not the way Noiz is rich, through scraping together what he can from an empire of crime and questionable dealings. No. The way the family he no longer cares to think about is. Old money. He considers leaving at that moment, but just as he turns on his heel he remembers the clarity of Koujaku’s face and the pressure of his weight, and he stops. He might as well at least see him again, see if things are the same or if his previous experience was only a glitch in the system.

He pushes the gate open and proceeds up the path. There is a doorbell, but in Noiz’s experience those are too easily ignored, so he kicks the door instead. And he kicks it. And kicks. And—

It slides open on the seventh kick, so abruptly he doesn’t notice until he swings his foot forward again and connects with nothing and nearly loses his balance.

“ _You!?”_ And there is Koujaku, eyes wrathful and bright in a face missing the usual screaming blur of fog that most humans have.

It wasn’t a glitch in the system. Noiz finds himself smiling again, feels the edges of his teeth as his tongue curls. “Oh.”

“Oh?” Koujaku repeats. “What do you want? Were you going to raid my home just like you did Aoba’s you filthy little bean sprout?”

This is quite possibly the dumbest insult Noiz has ever heard, and he’s heard a lot. “Because of this?” he points up at his hat and cocks his head, trying to see around him into the rest of the house. Everything in it looks old. _This guy really is obsessed._ “Let me in.”

“No.” If anything Koujaku shifts slightly to fill in more of the doorway.

“I have something of yours but whatever. Goodbye.”

It has the desired effect, and Noiz can’t help but grin as Koujaku grabs his shoulder and viciously jerks him into the hallway, sliding the door closed behind him with a snap. Without really knowing why, Noiz reaches out and turns the lock.

“I have this,” he shrugs as he pulls the wallet from his pocket and casually drops it onto the floor in one fluid motion.

Koujaku only stares. His mouth opens and closes once, twice. “What did you do with it?” he finally asks.

“I shoved it up my ass.”

“You _what_?”

“I just took your wallet and then brought it back. What’s the big deal?” he snaps despite himself. For some reason the fact that Koujaku believed him for even a second unsettles him.

“Fucking thief,” he mutters as he leans over to swipe it off the floor.

“I’m not a thief. I picked it up in the fight.”

The older man thumbs it open. “And stole my money.” He looks exasperated, disbelieving.

“Well yea.” He stuffs his hands back in his pockets and looks around. The conversation is already exhausting, frustrating, and he wants to provoke him into fighting again to end it. Not that he dislikes talking to him… “Your ID photo’s pretty lame.”

His exasperation intensifies, but he doesn’t react as Noiz hopes. Instead he only pulls his ID card out. “Why is everything sticky?”

 _Oh…Fuck. I forgot to wipe everything off._ He knew he’d made a mess, but it hadn’t occurred to him that he hadn’t put everything back neatly, had left wet plastic cards together with no hope of drying on their own, had even stuffed the soggy business card that he’d chewed up back in with the rest. He isn’t used to actually returning things he steals, or interacting with anyone long enough for them to notice how just how much he drools on things.

He shrugs.

Even after several years, there are still not many emotions Noiz can understand immediately on a human face. Horror, though; horror and disbelief and disgust. Those are the easy ones, the familiar ones, and those are what the older man is giving him now in rapid succession. _He really thinks —_

And then Koujaku is on him, throwing the wallet aside and lunging forward in one fluid motion.

 _Yes, yes yes this is just what —_ “Move fast for an old man,” he manages to shout as he leaps backwards himself and upsets a low table. “Figured you had arthritis by now…!”

Koujaku replies, hissing and spitting and indignant, but Noiz isn’t paying attention to his words. All that matters now is the fight. He’s laughing as Koujaku swings once, twice, and he dodges both before jerking his knee up and snapping the older man’s elbow, flinging his leg out to catch the meat of his upper arm with the toe of his boot in the same movement. But Koujaku is ready for him by the second strike, grabs his ankle with his other hand, and flips Noiz onto the ground. He’s ready for it, though he’s not ready for the other man to bodily throw himself on top of him and punch him right in the face. He spits blood as he rolls with him, grabbing his face to headbutt him, ramming the butt of his hand into his solar plexus, kneeing him in the groin. He knows Koujaku is landing just as many blows, but he can’t feel them, and in such close proximity he can’t see them either, so he ignores the bulk of them and laughs and laughs and surprises himself with the sound of his own voice. He came for two things, and now he has already accomplished one.

The first time he tries to kiss him, Koujaku smashes the butt of his hand into his left eye and knocks him back to the floor; Noiz is uncertain if he even knew what had just been attempted. The second time, there’s notably less resistance in the force he uses to push him back, but he still doesn’t have the chance to taste him. The third time, Koujaku grabs his face and slams him to the floor and kisses him in return, and Noiz opens his mouth and lets his tongue slide in and feels a searing confetti explosion of scars and sadness and sex and rage and antiquity and _red_ in the back of his skull, a rare moment when the sensations on his tongue are powerful enough to reverberate in his bones. He grins against his mouth and he bites him.

They roll over more than once, and Koujaku’s arm slides down around his waist and crushes them together in a way that is so strangely, infuriatingly, _distant_ , and Noiz who has grown used to not feeling, suddenly feels bitterness claw its way up his throat and over his tongue and into the other man’s mouth because he knows he is _missing_ somehow, and he doesn’t know what. But the moment passes when the older man sinks his teeth into his tongue and tears at the piercings, and he feels the echoes of the pain in his skull and tastes them in his blood as he arches up into Koujaku and stays viciously, _beauteously_ , silent as he forgets for one immaculate, sublime moment what it is to not know how to feel.

When they finally break away from one another to breathe, strings of saliva still locking them together as Koujaku gasps, Noiz finds himself on top, and so he holds the older man down and slowly runs his tongue over the scar bisecting his face. He can taste it, taste the knife that slashed open the bridge of his nose and made the young boy – he _knows,_ knows with his tongue, that he was young in that moment, at an age Noiz had never experienced beyond the room – howl and scream and later bear the scar as a testament to his strength in the glorified street fights that he calls Rib. And he can taste the decades of pain wrapped up in that mass of tissue that he so desperately wants to bite, but he resists the urge and leans back and smiles at cold red eyes. He can see both now, the right one surrounded by blue ink the same color as on his chest. He wants to taste that, too, wants to taste every inch of his tattoos, but decides there will be time enough for that later so he merely pulls his fist back and slams it down hard into Koujaku’s ribs.

They don’t kiss again, and whatever fight was in them seeps out of their bones within several more blows. _It is enough, enough for now._ He knows he will hold that moment for years.

Noiz groans, rolls onto his side and props himself up on an elbow. He rolls the blood in his mouth, pokes each tooth with his tongue to make sure they’re all still there, before speaking. “Where do you piss around here?” he asks abruptly.

“ _What_?” Koujaku jerks back as if punched again, jumping back to his knees. “Why are you so disgusting?”

“I need. To use. The. Toilet.” He says it as slowly as he can, marveling at Koujaku’s stupidity. “I can go on the floor though.”

“Down the hall and to your right. Door’s open,” he groans as he points. “Don’t touch anything and remember to flush and put the seat back down.”

 _This is ridiculous_. Noiz leans his head back and whistles softly. “Wow…do you have a check-in sheet I need to sign, too?”

“Just be civil.”

“Whatever,” he waves him off as he stands, brushes himself off, stuffs his hands as deep into his pockets as they go, and lopes down the hall. What he sees gives him pause, one foot frozen in the air above the threshold before he slowly places it down again. He’s expecting a nice bathroom, but not one with a private hot-tub in an adjoining room. He glances back down the hall at Koujaku, who is already rearranging the furniture, trying to erase his existence. _Old money_ , he sniffs, and steps inside, sliding the door closed behind him. There’s no lock, which doesn’t surprise him. When he’d first arrived in Japan, he’d stayed in a hotel without even a lock on his bedroom door, which had both mystified and horrified him. Locks had been so much a part of his life before Japan, after all.

Thankfully, Koujaku’s toilet doesn’t have nineteen buttons like so many others he’d come across here. There are only four, and Noiz pushes each and every one exactly three times after he does his business and is as far away from the toilet as he can be while still reaching them. _Nothing_ too _weird, at least_. He flushes, but he leaves the toilet seat up.

Then he turns to the medicine cabinet, glances at the bathroom door before carefully opening it. The first shelf is filled with wooden hairbrushes and combs and picks, and he methodically lifts each one to his mouth and licks it before moving onto the next. Nine in all. In the last he pulls out several strands of Koujaku’s hair and rolls them into a ball between his fingers before shoving that in his mouth as well. There are hair tonics and sprays and oils and all sorts of things that Noiz can’t even begin to comprehend as he chews on the hairball. He’s lucky if he remembers shampoo once a week. There is also a small first aid kit and medicine. Aspirin. Allergy pills. Heartburn. _Dude’s boring_. And then, one last bottle shoved behind the rest. A prescription. Noiz smiles as he turns it over and over in his hands; he can’t read the kanji, but that doesn’t matter. He opens it. Seventeen left. He takes two, pulls the hair from his mouth, and promptly swallows them. Then he carefully places the hairball on the toilet seat and moves onto the sink. The water goes on, hot, cold, both at once, as far back as they can go, water screaming and streaming into the sink while he gnaws on Koujaku’s toothbrush and washes his hands. He digs his nails into the soap, scarring it before dropping it back into the soap dish and turning the water off. Next he picks up the toothpaste - the fancy kind, with three colors – and proceeds to squeeze the entire tube out into the sink, round and round the drain until the tube is empty. Finally he reaches into his pocket, pulls out the 18,000 yen he had stolen earlier that day, takes a 5000 bill, rolls it as tightly as he can, and shoves it into the empty toothpaste tube. Cap back on. Tube back in the cup with the toothbrush he’d thoroughly drooled on.

It takes all of four minutes to do everything, and while he wants to examine the hot tub, he supposes he’ll have to return another time. With a shrug and one last glance around the bathroom, he turns on his heel and strides out, slamming the door shut behind him.

He’s standing there in the living room, arms folded across his chest and eyes narrowed. “You took long enough.”

“Yea, okay, Piss Police.”

Koujaku does that open-mouth-close-mouth stare again and Noiz finds himself smiling faintly.

“I’m hungry.”

“Get out.”

But Noiz only winks, grins despite himself. “It’s cool, old man. I know where the kitchen is.” And he is gone, skipping around the corner into the surprisingly small and unsurprisingly old-fashioned kitchen he had glimpsed earlier. When he had first moved to Japan and found his own apartment, there had been an elderly woman next door who had quite literally dragged him over for dinner several times. She hadn’t known a word of English, much less of German, and Noiz hadn’t the faintest idea how to interact with her, but he’d sat in her kitchen politely and swirled the foul tea she gave him around in the cup only to dump it down the sink or out the window whenever she turned her back. She’d passed away several months after he moved in, and he’d quickly bought up both that apartment and the one on the other side of him to secure his privacy, but he still thought of her kitchen sometimes, so similar to Koujaku’s here. Eggs on the counter, strings of vegetables and herbs hanging from the ceiling on the far wall, ceramic jars everywhere, a massive rice cooker… _But he must have pasta, right_?

Noiz can go for days at a time without walking into his own kitchen, and beyond a general appearance, he hasn’t the faintest idea were kitchen-users put things. He begins opening every drawer and cabinet he sees, one after another in rapid succession.

“What are you looking for?”

The voice surprises him, not because he’s there but because he doesn’t sound angry. He merely sounds… Noiz pauses with his hand shoved deep into a cabinet filled with expensive looking clay cups and bowls. No, he can’t figure out how he sounds, so he shrugs and jerks his hand back and opens another cabinet.

“I said, what are you-“

But Noiz raises his hand and glares at him to shut him up. He’s found what he’s looking for, and he points. “Why is this spaghetti in one piece?”

“It’s not spaghetti, you freak. It’s a ramen noodle block.”

“I’m not a freak. Ramen…” The word sounds familiar but he can’t place where he heard or saw it. Maybe someone was selling it in the street once.

“You don’t-??” Koujaku is hissing, spitting again.

But Noiz just ignores him as he picks up a pot off the stove and fills it with water before returning it to where it had been. It’s a gas stove, but even if it were electric he’d be at a loss. “I don’t know how to use this.”

“Get out.” He apparently was able to pull himself together

Noiz eyes him a moment before lifting the pot and slowly tilting it. “I hope you have a mop.”

“Just your face.”

“Your comebacks are garbage, you know,” he sighs.

“ _Piss police_ ,” Koujaku shoots back, leaning over with a lighter. “That’s how you use a gas stove.”

Whatever he had done, Noiz hadn’t noticed. He’d have to pay more attention next time, he supposes, or break in sometime and practice on his own. He shrugs, drops the block of noodles in and closes his eyes and blocks out Koujaku’s exasperated hissing. Apparently the water needed to boil first. “I’m used to takeout, okay?”

“Takeout. Every day?”

“Sometimes I have leftovers.” Congealed pizza peeled out of the box he left on the floor overnight, but Koujaku doesn’t need to know that.

If the older man with the sharply defined eyes and the scars on his fingers was going to say something, he keeps it to himself, and Noiz wonders for a panicked second as the fear builds on his tongue if he is beginning to pity him, because the next thing he says is remarkably reserved. "This is the wrong order of things but...What kind of broth do you want?"

He chews his lip a moment before replying. _Broth_? "Plain."

"Plain," he repeats, staring.

"Yea. Like. No broth. Just noodles.” And with a flood of relief he realizes he has an in. A way to be an ass again, curb whatever sentiment might be brewing in that fool’s head. “Haven't you ever made spaghetti before?"

"This isn't spaghetti," he snaps.

Noiz shrugs at the irritation in his voice and turns back to the column of drawers besides the sink. One drawer after another brings up nothing. _This is ridiculous._ He's seen forks and knives and spoons all over the place in Japan, and had managed to avoid chopsticks for years. _Why does this dude have to live like it's the 1700s? No wonder he does Rib..._

"You... don't... have...forks..." he says it slowly, enunciating each word.

"I don't use forks. I have chopsticks." Even as he speaks he pokes the noodles with a pair of chopsticks of his own, swiped off the counter.

Noiz pauses. He hasn't the faintest idea how to use chopsticks, and isn't sure if this is something he should admit, so he reaches his hand out and lets Koujaku pass him a pair. They're red, of course, and expensive-looking, just like so much else in the house.

Once Koujaku passes him a bowl, he attempts to scoop the pasta up, holding the chopsticks tightly together as a makeshift spoon. _This'd be so much easier if it wasn't all one fucking noodle._ And yet he keeps trying, managing to spear the ramen now and again but rarely getting it up to his mouth. He knows Koujaku is watching him intently.

"You don't know how to use those, do you?"

 _What the hell._ Noiz throws them down in disgust and crosses his arms over his chest. "Nope."

Koujaku's silent for a moment, clearly weighing his options before speaking, "Pass them over. And the bowl."

"No way. That's gross."

"We just—" He stops abruptly and sighs.

"Made out?" Noiz ventures as he finally slides the bowl over. _And I used your toothbrush_ , but this he sees no reason to divulge.

"Shut up!"

He raises his eyebrows and feels the edges of his teeth as his tongue curls. He remembers Koujaku's taste and wonders when he will taste it again. There's no "if" in his mind, because even now he can see one side of Koujaku's mouth turning up.

"First off, you never jab your chopsticks into the food like this, especially rice."

"Why?" He dimly remembers a time long ago when his mother slapped him for picking up the wrong fork at dinner. He doesn’t need rules like that.

Koujaku shakes his head. "It's a little too complicated for you. You hold the chopsticks like this."

Whatever he's doing, Noiz can't follow. Here, with Koujaku of the sharp lines and visible face, he feels his ability to see is improved tenfold, but he still can’t grasp what’s happening here. He leans over, resting his head on his hand as he half sprawls across the table. Koujaku's fingers are long and scarred and his nails are eerily perfect despite their fight earlier. He holds the chopsticks easily, and Noiz wonders for the second time that night how he holds scissors. He'll have to find out eventually. "I don't get it," he says finally, unable to see past the scars. For once his dull blur of a world is not because he is a glitch in the system with vague senses and dead nerves, but because someone else is in such clarity that he can’t focus on anything else.

The older man shrugs, takes a third and a fourth bite of the noodles. "Then too bad, I guess. You're not eating with your hands in my kitchen though."

"Put my fingers in the right place," he says it quickly, before he can change his mind, as he extends his arm across the table. He can't remember the last time he let someone touch him outside of violence, much less asked someone to do so, and he realizes suddenly that it was probably before he'd been locked up. _If he refuses I'm going to jump over this table and punch his stupid face in_ , he thinks numbly.

But Koujaku obliges. He slides his chair across the floor, dragging the bowl with him. "You fight like a rightie."

He only grunts in reply. Noiz is impressed that Koujaku could tell, though he quickly pushes the thought aside. He holds his right hand out and watches as the older man places the chopsticks and bends his fingers around them. It's strange, watching someone manipulate his fingers as if they weren't alive. Then again, perhaps they aren't.

Koujaku is frowning slightly, and Noiz realizes he is nervous, holding his hand this way. He feels an unexpected rage seeping beneath his tongue as he watches Koujaku's hand close over his, and he wants to lash out, break his fingers, force him back and punish him for touching him, reminding him of what he can never have. He wants to throttle him, scream at him that he's being a fool for being so embarrassed, because he can't and never will know what there is to be embarrassed about, so there's no reason for Koujaku to act that way. But he clenches his jaw and stays silent and unmoving, wondering what those scars feel like, wondering what it's like to have another human hold one's hand.

"Like this, see?"

"Yea," he hesitates a moment, still angry that Koujaku has managed to unnerve him and wondering how best to get back at him. "Now feed me."

The larger hand jerks back in disgust. _Success._ "You're deranged."

"I'm not deranged," Noiz smirks. He's still holding the chopsticks the right way. _Double success._

It's short-lived success, and within several seconds he's back to jabbing aimlessly at the noodles while Koujaku sighs and rolls his eyes. In the end Noiz drops them and goes back to his hands while the man sitting next to him groans and leans back and stares at the ceiling, and for six minutes he stays like that while Noiz finishes.

“Why are you even here?” he finally whispers.

“I returned your wallet.”

Koujaku clicks his tongue in irritation. “Yea. That you stole for the purpose of bringing it back.”

“Not quite.” Noiz shrugs for what feels like the tenth time in what can’t have been more than an hour since he walked through that door, and suddenly remembers the look of sheer horror on Koujaku’s face when he’d first realized how damp his wallet was. He feels the edges of his teeth and shoves his now-empty bowl away from him as he stands. “I’ll be going now.”

“Don’t come back.”

“Whatever, old man. You had fun.” _You kissed back_ , he almost says, but there’s no need. That isn’t something Koujaku is going to forget anytime soon. As he moves down the hall he bangs his hand against the wall, thumping into every piece of furniture he sees, upsetting a scroll with a hawk on it, hitting a potted plant none too gently, and sliding his hand across the table by the door. _Too easy_.

As he steps out into the night, he hears Koujaku come up behind him but he doesn’t turn, only pulls his hat down lower over his ears and hunches forward. But the older man stops at the threshold; he doesn’t speak until Noiz is at the gate. “See you around.”

The words startle him so much that he does what he does best – he ignores them, but there is a lightness in his step as he walks out into the street, jerks his finger up, swings a cab door open before the car’s fully come to a halt, and throws a few bills in the front seat. He lies down in the back seat, ignoring the demands of the driver to wear a seatbelt, pulls his hat over his eyes, and plays with his tongue rings and dreams of the confetti in his skull the whole way back to his apartment.

Noiz turns the lights on when he gets home, something he rarely does until recently. He pauses in the hallway, paces back and forth a few moments before stepping into the closet and immediately hunching down. Rocking back on his heels, he glances up at the ceiling. This is still a good space. The light from the hall flashes on the object he delicately draws from his pocket and places on the floor. He’s only going to look now, he tells himself. He’ll come back to it tomorrow to properly enjoy it, but still he sits and stares and feels his chipped teeth.

It’s a ring of keys.

 _His_ keys, specifically.


End file.
